Low expectations are seldom met for films that go straight to video. This is an exception for me.
Kilmer (McPhearson) plays a troubled marine who is sought out by a war buddy and travels to Arizona to reunite. When McPhearson arrives, he realizes that the town and its people are acting very strange. He meets Rhodes (Cole), who basically runs the town, and gets less than welcomed. The suspense thickens as the movie goes, adding a clever character twist at the end.
Kilmer does a good job with the role, but maybe I'm bias because I've liked his movies for a while. His delivery is solid, from interaction with Esposito to rugged one-liners with the bad guys. I even didn't mind him looking a little bloated, because he was playing the washed up war vet.
The only trouble I had was the way he tried to sell the excessively used close up blank stare, meant to show McPhearson suffering from his past. It simply came off bored.
The pacing is spot on. You dive right in with a shocking opening scene and build up accordingly into the meat of the story. It is pleasantly predictable at the right times, yet your left guessing when you want to be.
The ending is where this one will lose some. It starts to do what that string of films that destroyed Steven Segal's career did. Movies often step out of themselves at the end and beat you over the head with a message. This one gets a little self righteous, but not to where I thought it brought things down.
It's not Rambo or Die Hard, but if you're in the mood for a rental with solid action and suspense, its worth the four or five bucks.
Kilmer (McPhearson) plays a troubled marine who is sought out by a war buddy and travels to Arizona to reunite. When McPhearson arrives, he realizes that the town and its people are acting very strange. He meets Rhodes (Cole), who basically runs the town, and gets less than welcomed. The suspense thickens as the movie goes, adding a clever character twist at the end.
Kilmer does a good job with the role, but maybe I'm bias because I've liked his movies for a while. His delivery is solid, from interaction with Esposito to rugged one-liners with the bad guys. I even didn't mind him looking a little bloated, because he was playing the washed up war vet.
The only trouble I had was the way he tried to sell the excessively used close up blank stare, meant to show McPhearson suffering from his past. It simply came off bored.
The pacing is spot on. You dive right in with a shocking opening scene and build up accordingly into the meat of the story. It is pleasantly predictable at the right times, yet your left guessing when you want to be.
The ending is where this one will lose some. It starts to do what that string of films that destroyed Steven Segal's career did. Movies often step out of themselves at the end and beat you over the head with a message. This one gets a little self righteous, but not to where I thought it brought things down.
It's not Rambo or Die Hard, but if you're in the mood for a rental with solid action and suspense, its worth the four or five bucks.